Saturday, October 18, 2008

Craftsman Truck Series on SPEED From Martinsville

Krista Voda kicks things off at 2:30PM with The Set-Up show on SPEED. This thirty minute pre-race show mixes pre-produced features with interviews and news items.

Rick Allen hosts the race coverage with Michael Waltrip and Phil Parsons alongside. Ray Dunlap and Adam Alexander are on pit road. This is a full field of 36 trucks.

Voda once again has a nice points race that is coming down to the final event in Homestead. This race is going to feature a wide variety of NCTS regulars, Sprint Cup drivers, one-time specials and some former Cup drivers who are looking for 2009 rides.

The trucks struggled to get teams to Las Vegas, but now are going to be alongside of the Cup Series down the stretch. That means Cup drivers crossing-over and racing in the NCTS. One big question is how many full-time NCTS teams are going to be able to tow to Phoenix in several weeks?

The pre-race will profile driver Timothy Peters and his low budget team that operates out of neighborhood garage. As TDP mentioned earlier, SPEED owes fans a clarification about why Johnny Benson's truck is without a primary sponsor this week.

Allen and his crew will have what has been one of the most action-packed short track events on the NCTS schedule to call. The final laps in the last truck race at Martsinville resulted in some bent sheet metal and some very hot tempers. They don't call this the "payback track" for nothing.

SPEED's NCTS coverage has been solid all season. This is once again the regular SPEED crew handling the production, so expect the focus on racing and the "old school" style of NASCAR TV. Parsons is the Dean of the truck series and his knowledge about the personalities involved from top-to-bottom is first rate.

It always works better for SPEED to have Waltrip in the booth when he is racing at the same track. He has a better perspective on what the track is doing and the issues that the NCTS teams are dealing with when he has experienced it first hand.

Martinsville is famous for a very tough pit road, so watch for early pit stops without changing tires and then a long run to the finish. Track position is everything and the beating-and-banging usually starts with less than fifty laps to go.

This post will host your comments about the pre-race coverage and the live race telecast on SPEED. To add your opinion, just click on the COMMENT button below and follow the easy instructions. The rules for posting are located on the right side of the main page. Thanks for taking the time to stop by The Daly Planet.

I think this is where NASCAR Now lacks. They are all about news and the "late breaking" stories. Totally NASCAR (R.I.P.) did a better job in its existence to talk about all 3 series and give each its due credit. NASCAR tried the Nationwide weekly recap show before (Inside NBS) and it was short lived. I imagine if you were to pitch a show it would have to be a half-hour type show much as NBS 24/7 used to be but hopefully would have better ratings and should alternate between Truck and Nationwide teams weekly to keep things fresh with a quick recap of both series's weekly ongoings.

Im with you JD...I'd love to see a show but I have trouble seeing SPEED (because I have ZERO faith in ESPN to do so) creating a show without any Cup Series aspect.

I was cleaning the wood stove, don't know if they metioned the JB deal , looking forward to the race ,good short track racing. JD i'm with you on the weekly series,but at this point I'm keeping my fingers crossed there will be a series to report on .

Who actually was sponsoring Benson (as in, what is "Toyota Certified Used Cars").

The Dodge sponsorship of what is now GEM came from a fund of the consortium of Dodge dealers, not from corporate. It seems possible that auto sales could be so sluggish the Toyota dealers could need to make cutbacks to stay afloat.

I was talking to a GM dealership owner not long ago who said he was just pulling the Cadillacs off the lot and bringing in more Chevys.

If, as I am guessing, the dealers are the actual sponsor, maybe ESPN could ask Dale Jarrett - he got dealerships out of that deal to drive for Michael if I recall.

I think Bill Davis said earlier in the year that they had a handful of races that they did not have a sponsor. Toyota Used Certified I imagine is still a sponsor of theirs, its just not one for this race.

That is my MAIN GRIPE with the truck series. Can the canned underlayer of VERY DISTRACTING music so we can hear Rick and the boys talk...SPEED has problems with this on many shows...suits at SPEED trying to be hip I guess.

I missed the pre race and might not catch the end of this race but will put a tape in.

Guess mum is the word on 'mentioning' the struggle of this series from TPTB I guess?

But if the guitar music is the only gripe, that can be easily remedied by SPEED folks IF they want us to "hear" what is being said. :)

jo here had to make my name the same everywhere on the net.I too loved the Timothy Peters segment, & Mikey has gotten way better as a broadcaster on the truck series ( so far) & I really wish for even a 1/2 hour show (other than just prerace) to re cap & let us know about CTS drivers and owners.

Krista Voda did a great job with the Setup show. The Timothy Peters piece was outstanding. The race coverage was great as usual. It's great to see vehicles racing under green on my TV instead of full-screen video packages. It's great to hear useful pit reports about the handling of vehicles and pit strategies and not an excessive amount of forced reports about comments a driver or team member had days or weeks before the event. It's great to have a play-by-play announcer that actually calls the action and is genuinely excited by side-by-side racing for the lead, as opposed to one that only reads stats or lays out completely when there is action going on. It's also great to see the whole field cross the finish line at the end of the race with a real-time vertical drop-down of the finishing results, as opposed to a badly delayed and quickly disappearing horizontal display of 5 spots at a time and last week's "focus on the wife" approach immediately after the Cup winner crossed the line.

Major thanks to all the men and women involved in these Truck Series broadcasts on Speed. You should be very proud of yourselves because week in and week out you continuously put your competition to shame.

Great job SPEED ! Rick and Phil are great in the pxp action. The camera work is fantastic, you get to see just about everything that is going on. To me they are the best. better then CUP. they out shine their competition. Keep up the good work guys.

"Benson went low in Turn 3 and put his unsponsored Bill Davis Racing Toyota under Hornaday and into the lead on Lap 155." (truckseries.com)

"Sponsor Needed… The weekend’s 200-lap event will be the first time this season the No. 23 Toyota Tundra team will not have corporate sponsorship. The NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series Championship-contending team will bring a blank red-and-black Toyota Tundra to the Virginia short track." (BillDavisRacing.com)

Toyota certified is NOT gone. They were on the tailgate of that truck today.

I believe earlier in the year, ORP, Bill Davis said they needed to cover 2 or 3 races before the end of the season. I think at ORP going into that race they didn't have anyone on that truck either and someone stepped up at the last minute.

If Toyota was going to pull money, dont you think Skinner's truck would have been bare also?

Or if they were going to pull their sponsorship they would pull from the truck lower in the standings?

I know it doesnt present a good image to see the winning truck blank but thats 2 for 2 at M-ville. Setzer's truck was pretty bare earlier this year too.

Johnny wouldn't thank the sponsor if they were gone totally. Classy guy, but if your sponsor up and walks, you don't thank them.

All-in-all good broadcast. I missed the last couple laps so I didn't get to hear the call to the finish. Wild from the way it sounded. Happy to see they interviewed a good number of guys after the race.